Who Will Stop the Madman – A Gogol's Prophecy [by Lera Auerbach]

My mother was born in 1940 to a Jewish family in Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine. As Hitler's army marched East in 1941, my grandparents abandoned all their possessions (including their beloved library and cherished collection of musical instruments). They boarded the train – heading towards Siberia. The news of ghettos and the fate of Jews in Hitler's territories had reached them – all they could do was to flee into the unknown.

A few years earlier, my mother's grandfather, Berl Fishbein, the head of the family, was tortured to death by Stalin's secret police). His only "guilt" was being born Jewish. While my family evacuated, their train was bombed by Hitler's armies. Another tragedy occurred: the family lost my mother's grandmother Ettel Fishbein in the confusion and chaos. She was grief-stricken after the death of her beloved husband, frightened and confused over all the changes and sorrows that the war and evacuation brought. Somehow, after the bombing, she was no longer with my grandparents on the train. They never found her and never learned of her fate. 

With my one-year-old mother, my grandparents deboarded in Chelyabinsk – a closed industrial city at the gateway of Siberia. I was born there some thirty years later. They never returned to their abandoned homes in Ukraine.

In today's war, the invading army marches from the East, and more than a million Ukrainian refugees head West – to Germany in a mirror retrograde of history.

Earlier this year, I wrote a cello concerto, Diary of a Madman, inspired by Gogol's famous short story about Poprishchin, a government clerk who gradually descends into insanity. The concerto was premiered last month by the Munich Philharmonic, Giedrė Šlekytė, and Gautier Capuçon. Nikolai Gogol (or, more correctly, romanized from Ukrainian – Mykola Hohol) – was a genius writer, born in Ukraine, father of Russian language literature, and a visionary far beyond his time. I have been fascinated by his work all my life. Ten years ago, while composing my opera Gogol, I read and re-read everything he ever wrote. After my opera's premiere in Vienna, I received an open letter from Russia calling me "Vrag Naroda" (Enemy of the People) – the same terminology used against Shostakovich and many other artists years earlier. My website was hacked, erased, and replaced by the slogan "Death to Jews" and a skull. It felt terrible, but I was not afraid – since 1991, I lived in the West, and since 2001, I no longer had any relatives in Russia. I was responsible only for myself, my words, and my actions. 

While composing the cello concerto Diary of a Madman, I did not think of Vladimir Putin. Now, Gogol's tale carries an eerie resonance. Diary of a Madman is a story of a lowly government bureaucrat with a minimal, easily forgettable personality. In his increasingly demented diary entries, Poprishchin claims that a state cannot "be without a king." As the storyline progresses, he becomes increasingly mad, starts having delusions of grandeur, and, finally, on the "43rd of April of the year 2000" he believes himself as the King. (V. Putin was first elected president of Russia on the 7th of May of the year 2000. Gogol wrote his story in 1835!) Finally, Poprishchin ends up in an insane asylum. 

Perhaps, Gogol, the visionary and one of the greatest writers who ever lived – could see beyond the 19th and 20th century – into the heart of the 21st, where we are doomed to continue the eternal tale.

I think of my grandparents and my child-mother in Ukraine, leaving everything behind, heading into the unknown – evacuating from the onslaught of Hitler's army. Could they have imagined that eighty years later, the land of their birth would face again a very similar nightmare and that refugees would now head West to Germany to save their children?

Gogol's visions and nightmares become a reality, with the whole world turning into a lunatics' asylum as the great tragedy unfolds. Who will stop the Madman? 

 

Comments

[Emily Fragos]

Oh, Lera Auerbach, this extraordinary photograph and this extraordinary recounting of lives which I, as a spoiled American, can barely fathom. I am grateful that you came to New York to study music and I am relieved that you stayed. We are so much richer for your brilliant presence amongst us. The people of Ukraine are being bombed, blown apart, and annihilated. This unprovoked onslaught is unspeakable. If you still have relatives in the Ukraine, I pray that they may survive or escape once again.

[J.A. Josephson]

As a historian and theologian, I must point out that human history repeats itself, over and over again, because of limitations on human perception. From ancient texts to last week's news, it's the same story: Men take themselves for gods and overreach, kill dissenters, abuse women, make fatal mistakes. Their empires rise and fall--and then we die, all of us. My grandparents and their three older children left Dniepropetrovsk in 1905, before the Russian Revolution, when it was still Ekaterinaslav, part of Imperial Russia. They escaped the Russian pogroms and made a new life in New York. Relatives who stayed were never heard from again. In the 20th century, most immigrants wanted to "assimilate" as much and as quickly as possible, especially secular Jewish families whose children learned English in public schools and taught it to their parents. I am only a year younger than Lera Auerbach's mother. This is the first time in many years that I've thought about my distant, historical root in what is now Dnipro. First-generation Americans in my cohort did not identify as "hyphenated" Americans. I've lived in several other countries and speak several other languages, but not Russian or Ukrainian. Nonetheless, I feel for the people under siege, whether they stay or flee. Putin is a dictator who wants to be an emperor, like all other emperors. The only difference is that he is a common thug, not descended from any royal family. It's naive to think he would obey any "rules of war," international treaties, or negotiated agreements between combatants. I understand why heads of state need to be cautious. This could become World War III. Nuclear weapons would destroy much of Europe and create worldwide disaster. When is the CIA going to justify its budget and intervene?

[Dr. Earle Hitchner]

Your essay, Lena, left me speechless in admiration and solidarity. But I eventually managed to muster these few words here. My hope is that they will spur other BAP blog readers to circulate your essay to anyone else with an ear for truth, as I did before writing this comment.

[Dr. Earle Hitchner]

My deepest apology to Lera Auerbach for the typo in my previously posted comment. I meant to write "Lera," not "Lena." I hope my accidental misspelling does not distract in the slightest from the extraordinary power of her words.

[Bernd Buldt]

Vrag Naroda? Wear it as a badge of honor!

I was sorry to hear about the pain inflicted on your family. I imagine them proud of what you've created since and against the odds.

[Mamiko Watanabe]

So this is a photo of your child-mother and young grandparents. So lovely, beautiful and precious memory. Thank you very much for showing us.
I’m so sad some of so-called “dictators” doing the same foolish things again and again and again. Small but peace loving , modest people have been suffering all through the histories. These crazy things should never be done again, now, after 80 years of our efforts. All of us on the world should stop this Madman immediately. The sorrow of your family can’t be wasted behind the history of the human being.

[Slow Reader]

I am also speechless with admiration for your courage and the courage of your family, and heartbroken for the profound suffering and loss which you and your family have endured. Putin's "solution" for Ukraine is genocide, extermination, erasure: the same as Stalin's Holomodor and Hitler's Holocaust. President Zelensky so rightly expressed the truth of where we are today: "Never Again" is absolutely meaningless.

[Kyril Calsoyas]

But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.

Truly high moral ground.